Monitor: Seven Dead In Eastern Syria Air Strikes

A Syrian army soldier stands on a damaged building in Deraa al Balaad, Syria, September 9, 2021. REUTERS/Yamam al Shaar
A Syrian army soldier stands on a damaged building in Deraa al Balaad, Syria, September 9, 2021. REUTERS/Yamam al Shaar
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Monitor: Seven Dead In Eastern Syria Air Strikes

A Syrian army soldier stands on a damaged building in Deraa al Balaad, Syria, September 9, 2021. REUTERS/Yamam al Shaar
A Syrian army soldier stands on a damaged building in Deraa al Balaad, Syria, September 9, 2021. REUTERS/Yamam al Shaar

Seven people have been killed after air strikes destroyed a convoy of trucks that crossed into eastern Syria from Iraq, a war monitor said Monday.

The seven were “truck drivers and their assistants, all of them non-Syrians", the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, adding that they were “killed as a result of unidentified aircraft targeting a convoy of Iran-backed groups, last night.”

The strikes destroyed a convoy of six refrigerated trucks transporting Iranian weapons in the Boukamal border region, the Observatory, which has a wide network of sources inside Syria, had said Sunday.

No country claimed the strikes, but Israel has carried out hundreds of air and missile strikes against Iran-backed and government forces in Syria, where the US military is also active.

“The trucks were transporting Iranian weapons,” Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman had told AFP Sunday.



Türkiye Says It Believes Kurdish Fighters Will Be Forced Out of All Syrian Territory

Turkish Defense Minister Yasar Guler takes part in a NATO Defense Ministers' meeting at the Alliance's headquarters in Brussels, Belgium October 12, 2023. (Reuters)
Turkish Defense Minister Yasar Guler takes part in a NATO Defense Ministers' meeting at the Alliance's headquarters in Brussels, Belgium October 12, 2023. (Reuters)
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Türkiye Says It Believes Kurdish Fighters Will Be Forced Out of All Syrian Territory

Turkish Defense Minister Yasar Guler takes part in a NATO Defense Ministers' meeting at the Alliance's headquarters in Brussels, Belgium October 12, 2023. (Reuters)
Turkish Defense Minister Yasar Guler takes part in a NATO Defense Ministers' meeting at the Alliance's headquarters in Brussels, Belgium October 12, 2023. (Reuters)

Türkiye believes Syria's new rulers, including the Syrian National Army (SNA) armed group which Ankara backs, will drive Kurdish YPG fighters from all territory they occupy in northeastern Syria, Defense Minister Yasar Guler said on Sunday.

Türkiye regards the Syrian YPG as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants who have fought an insurgency against the Turkish state for 40 years and are deemed terrorists by Ankara, Washington, and the European Union.

The YPG spearheads an alliance, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which is backed by the United States and controls territory in northeastern Syria. Since the fall of Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad two weeks ago, Türkiye and Syrian groups it backs have fought against the SDF, seizing the city of Manbij.

"We believe that the new leadership in Syria and the Syrian National Army, which is an important part of its army, along with the Syrian people, will free all territories occupied by terrorist organizations," Guler said during a visit to Turkish troops on the Syrian border with military commanders.

"We will also take every necessary measure with the same determination until all terrorist elements beyond our borders are cleared," he said in a video released by his ministry.

Ankara has demanded the Syrian Kurdish fighters disband, and has called on Washington to withdraw its support. The US military acknowledged last week it has 2,000 troops on the ground in Syria, twice as many as it had said previously.

On Saturday, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said Türkiye would do "whatever it takes" to ensure its security if Syria's new administration was unable to address its concerns.